Understanding and facilitating weight control has represented a personal challenge for many individuals throughout much of modern history. As a public health matter, the health science community has long sought dietary, pharmaceutical, herbal and other effective means for assisting people in achieving and maintaining a healthy body composition. In the Western World, the proportion of the population that is overweight has increased dramatically over the last century. Estimates place approximately 30 percent of the adult American population as obese, defined as having a body weight of 30 percent or more above an ideal body weight. In addition, the sheer percentage of overweight adults has climbed to approximately 65 percent of the total population. This condition has now reached epidemic proportions. It is strongly believed that the problems in the West with obesity, and weight control generally, are largely the result of diet. The term “Western Diet” has come to be used to describe the diet typical of many Americans. This type of diet is high in sugar, high in fat, in particular animal fats, and includes only relatively low amounts of fiber and fruits and vegetables. In contrast, Asian diets are believed to be superior. The typical Asian diet is lower in sugar and fat, and higher in fiber and fruits and vegetables. As an example of the significance of the difference in diet, Asian populations tend to have a dramatically lower incidence of obesity and other weight problems. However, many people of Asian descent that conform their dietary habits to American norms develop weight-related problems similar to many Americans. It is believed that the Western Diet results in a relatively high concentration of free radicals in the body. Thus, free radicals have been at least loosely associated with different forms of cancer, aging and other ailments. In addition, free radicals throughout the body are eliminated by pairing their free electrons with electrons otherwise present in the nervous system, blood, or elsewhere in the body. Thus, free radicals may be said to “steal” electrons useful or essential in numerous other physiological functions.
Innumerable “miracle diets,” herbs, drugs and other techniques have been proposed over the years for assisting in bringing this scourge under control. Among the more popular plans have been diet drugs, for example, stimulants containing caffeine or amphetamine derivatives. The drug cocktail known by the trade name “Phen-Fen” offered promise in the 1990's as an effective pharmaceutical treatment, however, its use was linked to heart valve damage, and it was pulled from the shelves. Other popular recent formulations have included “blockers,” compounds that claim to adsorb or otherwise attach to and allow elimination of fats, sugars, etc. without metabolism by the body. Even if these formulations are effective in assisting in weight control, they present a significant drawback in that they also block essential nutrients and/or essential fats. Moreover, many fats are actually nutritious, and are an integral part of a healthy diet.
In addition to the ingestion of pharmaceutical and herbal compounds, various food-type diets have been proposed. Perhaps most familiar of these is the “Adkins Diet.” The Adkins diet is characterized by ingestion of relatively high amounts of fatty and protein-rich foods, absent any significant consumption of carbohydrates, including fruits and vegetables. The efficacy of the Adkins diet has been seriously called into question. Further, high fat diets have been shown to be associated with a higher incidence of heart disease, cancer, strokes and a host of other health problems.
A more traditional approach has been the calorie counting diet. However, it is well known that restricting calorie and food intake creates substantial cravings for the foods that an individual is denied. For instance, upon losing weight via a calorie-reduced diet, individuals often binge, returning to their old eating habits with a vengeance. For example, rather than eating a single slice of pizza after finishing a calorie restricted diet, individuals may fail to achieve satisfaction until they have gorged themselves on an entire pizza. A very common, repeating pattern of weight loss and weight gain, known as “yo-yo-ing” is observed in many persons attempting to lose weight on such a diet. Not only are calorie-restricted diets of limited long-term effectiveness, they can create feelings of unpleasantness for the individuals following them. Typically, individuals feel a significant deprivation of the pleasure and satisfaction associated with eating.
A technical term well known in the health sciences for the state of satisfaction an individual reaches after completing a meal is “satiety.” This term, satiety, represents an essentially homeostatic state wherein the individual “feels” that their cravings are satisfied or minimized. Many physiological factors are believed to bear on an individual's satiety. For instance, gustation, or taste, olfaction, or smell, as well as a feeling of fullness of the stomach may all contribute to whether an individual feels “sated.”
The present invention is directed to one or more problems or shortcomings set forth above, and otherwise well known in the health sciences.